Turnout Up, Costs Down in San Mateo County's All-Mail Election

With ballots still being tallied, San Mateo County’s elections chief says one of the state’s first all-mail elections is proving a success on several scores, starting with turnout.

The last time San Mateo County held a similar election, in 2013, turnout was 25.4 percent. This year, it’s well over 28 percent, according to Chief Elections Officer Mark Church. He adds that all-mail elections are also cheaper, because of everything the registrar doesn't have to do.

"In a traditional election, we recruit and train some 1,700 poll workers," Church explains. "We test and deploy some 1,400 voting machines, and we secure some 209 polling places. And most of those costs are eliminated for this program. We don't know the exact savings of this program, but we do know there will be a significant savings."

Ballots were sent to more than 357,000 registered voters. According to the county's elections website, 75,225 ballots were cast, the vast majority sent in by mail rather than dropped off at local City Halls or cast at polling stations set up for in-person voting. More ballots are being counted as this article posts, because ballots postmarked by Election Day that come in up to three days later are still considered valid. The county will issue updates on Nov. 9 and again on Nov. 12.

Watch Mark Church explain the fascinating and laborious process of tallying the vote.

Oregon, Washington and Colorado have all-mail statewide elections, but California is dipping its toe in the water first with a pilot program. Initially, Yolo County was the only test subject, holding a pair of small special elections by mail in March 2013.

Yolo found significant cost savings, but no big boost in turnout.

Then Assemblyman  Kevin Mullin wrote AB2028, allowing San Mateo County to take part and offer state lawmakers a perspective from a bigger, more diverse county.

"I believe that the final results and overall data collected in San Mateo County, along with observations from existing models in Colorado and Oregon, will show the benefits of moving to 'all-mail' elections on a statewide basis,” Mullin says. “The raw data -- over 100,000 ballots received versus an average of 85,000 over the last four elections -- shows that we have reversed a long-term trend of declining turnout in local, off-year elections."

Under the bill, San Mateo County and Yolo County are to conduct three all-mail local elections. San Mateo's next test run is in November 2017. After each election, the counties are expected to report to the state on key issues like cost, turnout and demographic diversity.

A consultant has been hired to determine if the all-mail election also encouraged more nonwhite voters to vote. Church says San Mateo County made a big push to reach voters who prefer languages other than English, particularly Spanish and Chinese. There were radio and TV ads, social media campaigns and billboards. Bilingual staff members were sent to community events to encourage people to register and participate.

But What About the Stickers?

Many enthusiastic voters are rather fond of the little sticker you get when you vote at a polling station.  Those who vote by mail don't get them.

"You'd be amazed at the number of people that love and covet those stickers," acknowledges Church. He says mail voters can still get one in San Mateo County if they show up at one of 32 "universal" polling stations on Election Day.

Universal polling places are connected to a countywide voter registration database. "So we can determine voter eligibility issues in real time, right on the spot," Church explains. "That enables voters to vote anywhere in the county, regardless of where they live, and receive their specific ballot type."

They can also confirm that you already voted by mail and give you that precious sticker.